Stadt

Forms

Stadt f (genitive Stadt, plural Städte, diminutive Städtchen n or Städtlein n)^[1] The spelling stadt appears at the beginning of the 16th century, in Alberus and in documents of 1507, but a clear spelling distinction from Statt was made only in the 18th century.^[2][3] Adelung already saw the dt as a purely orthographic device.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle High German stat, inherited from Old High German stat (“place, site”), inherited from Proto-West Germanic *stadi, inherited from Proto-Germanic *stadiz (“place”).^[4][5][1] The same word is Old Saxon stedi, Old English stede, Gothic 𐍃𐍄𐌰𐌸𐍃 (staþs) and Old Norse staðr, the last three masculine; English stead continues it.^[4][5] It is a concrete noun formed with a ti-suffix from the root of stehen, Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand”), parallel to Ancient Greek στάσις (stásis, “position”), so that it first meant “a standing, a stand”.^[4][1] Kroonen and Wiktionary reconstruct the noun as *stéh₂tis.^[5][1]

Statt and Stätte are the same word, the latter formed back from the plural; the prepositions statt and anstatt come from the dative singular.^[6][4] The sense “town” took over the place of the older word Burg: Kluge dates the change to after 1200, Pfeifer and Duden to the 12th century.^[4][3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Old High German stat is found from the 8th century, in the Abrogans and other glosses, in Isidor, the Tatian, Otfrid and Notker, meaning “place, spot, dwelling, region”, and only sometimes “town”, for Latin locus, sedes, habitatio and civitas.^[6][8] The usual Old High German word for “town” was burg, which translated civitas and urbs.^[9][10]

Semantic evolution

From “place” the word early came to mean “dwelling, settlement”, the sense in old place names in -stadt, -statt, -städt(en) and -stett(en).^[7] In the 12th century it became the name of the medieval legal town, which had market rights, its own administration and free citizens.^[7][3] Paul sees the start in phrases with a place name such as diu stat ze Babenberc “the town at Bamberg”, and the frequent pairing burg und stat helped the change.^[11][2]

Luther used it for Jerusalem and Babylon, and the town came to be set against the village and the country, as in the old pairing in der stat und auf dem lant.^[11] By metonymy it also means the inhabitants (die ganze Stadt weiß es, Adelung) and the town administration.^[11][12] Derivatives are Städter (Middle High German steter), which unlike Bürger has no political meaning, städtisch (15th century) and verstädtern (19th century).^[3][7]

Timeline

• 8th century – Old High German stat “place” appears in glosses.^[4][6]
• 12th century – Middle High German stat becomes the name of the chartered town.^[7][3]
• 13th century – According to Kluge, the modern sense is established.^[4]
• 15th century – First record of städtisch.^[3]
• 1507 – The spelling stadt appears in documents of Obermoschel.^[2]
• 18th century – Stadt and Statt are consistently distinguished in spelling.^[3][7]
• 19th century – verstädtern “to become urban” appears.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A town or city: a large, compact settlement with its own rights, the administrative, economic and cultural centre of an area: Sie lebt seit Jahren in einer kleinen Stadt an der Mosel.^[12][1]
2. The inhabitants of a town: Die halbe Stadt war auf dem Marktplatz.^[12][13]
3. The town administration or council: Ihr Vater arbeitet bei der Stadt.^[12][1]
4. The town centre, the shopping district: Wir fahren morgen in die Stadt.^[12][1]

Word family

• Städter
• städtisch
• verstädtern
• Großstadt
• Kleinstadt
• Hauptstadt
• Hansestadt
• Innenstadt
• Hafenstadt
• Kreisstadt
• Grenzstadt
• Schlafstadt
• Bundesstadt

Related words

• Stätte
• statt
• anstatt
• stehen
• Burg
• English stead

Usage notes

Die Ewige Stadt is Rome (probably after Tibullus), die Heilige Stadt Jerusalem and die Goldene Stadt Prague.^[12] In place names such as Eichstett the ending -stett is the old locative or dative.^[2][11]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Grimm, Jacob; Grimm, Wilhelm (1854–1961), Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. in 32, Leipzig: Hirzel; digital: Wörterbuchnetz, Trier Center for Digital Humanities, p. 17, 420
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Pfeifer, Wolfgang, et al. (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen, 2nd ed., Berlin: Akademie-Verlag; digital revised version in the DWDS, dwds.de
4. ^ a b c d e f g Kluge, Friedrich; Seebold, Elmar (2011), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, 25th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 874
5. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 8, 1004
7. ^ a b c d e f Duden. Das Herkunftswörterbuch: Etymologie der deutschen Sprache (2020), 6th ed., Duden vol. 7, Berlin: Dudenverlag, p. 810
8. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 311
9. ^ Lloyd, Albert L.; Springer, Otto; Lühr, Rosemarie, et al. (1988–), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Althochdeutschen, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht; online ewa.saw-leipzig.de, p. 2, 457
10. ^ Schützeichel, Rudolf (2012), Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch, 7th ed., Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter, p. 65
11. ^ a b c d Paul, Hermann (2002), Deutsches Wörterbuch: Bedeutungsgeschichte und Aufbau unseres Wortschatzes, 10th ed., ed. Helmut Henne, Heidrun Kämper and Georg Objartel, Tübingen: Niemeyer
12. ^ a b c d e f Duden. Das große Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache in zehn Bänden (1999), 3rd ed., Mannheim: Dudenverlag
13. ^ Wiktionary, das freie Wörterbuch (German Wiktionary), de.wiktionary.org